The boss of Severn Trent said investment and efficiencies were helping boost turnover and improve services while keeping average bills down.

Chief executive Liv Garfield said the water company had the lowest bills in England and Wales – averaging out at less than £1 a day, or £34 a year cheaper than the next cheapest supplier.

She also said they had significantly cut the number of overflowing sewers they had to deal with and were beating a target to help more than 50,000 “vulnerable customers” with their bills and service this year.

“It is also clear in today’s society that businesses, including the water sector, are under increasing scrutiny and greater pressure to explain their contribution to society beyond financial profit.

Severn Trent deal with a leaking water main outside Leicester Market last summer (Image: Chris Gordon)

“We need to make sure our decisions strike the right balance between all of our stakeholders and show we run our business in a sustainable and responsible way.

“As a result of the hard work of everyone at Severn Trent and their focus on the areas that are most important to our customers, we’ve reduced total sewer floodings by 48 per cent.”

She said turnover for the six months to September 30 was more than £850 million – £30 million up on the same period last year – mainly due to price increases, the acquisition of the Dee Valley water company and growth in Severn Trent’s business services.

Pre-tax profits for the period were down fractionally at around £296 million, while the business spent £324 million on infrastructure and capital investments.

Ms Garfield announced the business was also planning to sell off millions of pounds of spare land which would “help the housing shortage and benefit customers through lower future bills”.

She said: “In maximising value from our assets for the longer term, we today announce plans to sell land made available through operational efficiency.

“The water sector has been transformed for the better over the last 25 years, with more reliable, more efficient and more environmentally friendly services, but there is still much to do. “At Severn Trent we’re determined to rise to the challenge of delivering even better value for money to customers.”

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Sarah Bentley, chief customer officer, told the Mercury the business provided fresh water and waste services for 8 million people across central England and Wales and employed 6,200 staff – with more jobs being created.

There are almost 500 staff who live in Leicestershire.

In August Severn Trent announced it had enrolled 61 young people into its latest apprenticeship programme, including six from Leicestershire.

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Ms Bentley said: “We announced 250 new jobs recently, which are frontline jobs in the region.

“We are also increasing efficiencies by using things like drones to inspect storage tanks, rather than having to erect expensive scaffolding – we have even retrained some of our colleagues to fly the drones for us.”